On January 29, 2024, the Tennessee Firearms Association and the Tennessee Firearms Foundation joined Gun Owners of America and several other organizations in submitting an amicus brief to the United States Supreme Court in the case of Merrick B. Garland, Attorney General, et al., v. Cargill, No. 22-976.
The issue in this action is whether the ATF had constitutional authority to reclassify semi-automatic firearms, primarily the AR15, as machineguns if the firearm’s stock was one that is commonly known as a “bumpstock.”
Prior to the ATF’s rule change it had issued at least 15 letters stating its official position that a bumpstock neither constituted a machinegun nor transformed a semi-automatic rifle into a machinegun. In reliance on the ATF’s actions, many manufacturers made bumpstocks and hundreds of thousands, if not more, American citizens lawfully purchased bumpstocks, at a price in the range of $200 or more each, for their personal or recreational use.
After the Las Vegas murders on October 1, 2017, gun control advocates once again seized on the tragedy to demand that Congress enact more gun control. Although some in Congress proposed legislation, Congress did not enact any of it. When Congress refused to change the statutory definitions, then President Donald Trump directed the ATF to take action against bumpstocks. Not surprisingly, Donald Trump’s instruction to the administrative agency that he controlled resulted in the ATF concluding that its many prior letters finding that bumpstocks did not convert semiautomatic firearms to machineguns were wrong.
A court challenged was made and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals held that ATF’s reclassification of semiautomatic firearms having bumpstocks as machineguns subject to the National Firearms Act was in error and struck down the ATF’s rule. ATF appealed to the Supreme Court which will address the issue in 2024.
Tennessee Firearms Association and the Tennessee Firearms Foundation (a 501c3 charity) have joined with Gun Owners of America and numerous others to support the Fifth Circuit’s opinion and ask the Supreme Court to affirm the Fifth Circuit’s decision and forever strike down the bumpstock ban.
If you appreciate this work and would like to help the Tennessee Firearms Association and the Tennessee Firearms Foundation, please consider joining the TFA, making a supplemental member contribution to the TFA, and/or making a tax deductible contribution to the Tennessee Firearms Foundation.
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